


Mutual Pining

by OceanTheSoulRebel



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Act 2, Camping, Carver loves and protects mages okay, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, First Times, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, I'm not hearing any slander about my boy, Long-ish leadup, a remix of 'there was only one bed', templar!Carver, there was only one tent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-05 03:01:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21206330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OceanTheSoulRebel/pseuds/OceanTheSoulRebel
Summary: A week of shore-leave turned into an impromptu camping trip with Merrill, and Carver made the mistake of not checking when Isabela and his sibling helped pack the bags. It had all the essentials, Bela swore, except for one thing:It only had one tent.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Set somewhere in Act 2, and Carver’s been a Templar now a year and a half or so.

Carver was halfway onto the boat with the handful of other knights when Rutherford's voice rang out over the docks.

"Remember to uphold the duties and values of the Order, even on your days off," the Knight-Captain said, eyes tight in the dying daylight. "You are still Templars of the Chantry, and I expect you to comport yourselves accordingly. I'd best not to hear any complaints about the lot of you during your leave."

The unspoken implication settled, heavy on the crisp autumn air. Rutherford was considered fair, and maybe he was, as opposed to their Knight Commander. Anyone could be kind when compared to Commander Stannard, really, but Rutherford was still a tight-ass. He stood ready to punish them all for anything even mildly 'unworthy,' no matter how small the infraction.

Maker, that man needed a vacation. When was the last time he took leave from their marble and steel prison?

Rutherford uncrossed his arms, but it didn't look like anything unclenched. Poor bastard. "Maker watch over you all. I'll see you back on duty in a week."

Diligent murmurs of _Yes, Knight-Captain_ swirled into the evening air. Carver gave a quick salute and rolled his shoulders before taking an oar. The creaking boat sped through the calm waters of the bay toward Kirkwall proper.

He focused on the burn in his shoulders. Good, honest work, different from hauling his weight around and hitting dummies in the training yard, better than being a tin escort for the young apprentices going to and fro around the campus. It reminded him of Ferelden, which in turn made him think of his sibling and mother, which only led him to—

He couldn't think of her. Couldn't think of any of them, really. Not yet, not while still in Templar-mode and with Cullen's eyes on his back.

The Kirkwall docks soon came into view, its lanterns growing brighter as the boat approached. A quick tie off and a rope ladder later, Carver waved to the boatswain as she set back for the Gallows before turning to find Varric waiting for him.

Ugh, he was a sight for sore eyes, a welcome friend after a month of the shit that was the Gallows.

"Hey there, Junior," Varric called with a smile, and just like that, he ruined it. Carver grumbled but let himself be pulled into a one-armed hug. "Still as surly as ever, I see."

_You'd be, too, if you worked the Gallows,_ Carver bit back. He chose this, he reminded himself. Chose it for Mother and for the group of assorted misfits his sibling had taken to adopting like motherless ducklings. He chose it for men like Ser Carver, his templar namesake, who treated his father and other mages well. He even chose it for Bethany, a secret he held in his heart, in hopes that he could be a good man in the Gallows, even if he ended up being the only one.

Carver chose it for everyone Eli had left behind on the Deep Roads expedition—for everyone who sat like ghosts when Bartrand declared the caravan, and everyone with, it lost to the dark.

He might hate his job, but what he earned had paid for the back-taxes and bills for the Amell estate when the Hawke was presumed lost and Aveline couldn’t—wouldn’t—help him. It paid for supplies for Anders' clinic and the Ferelden refugee cooperative. It helped furnish Merrill's small home in the alienage. It even grudgingly bought a monthly tab for Gamlen at the Hanged Man, as loathe as Carver was to admit to the deed. 

And it wasn’t bad work, either. He protected children and helped students be the best they could be. It was hard; the physical toll lyrium took was whispered about in the infirmary, and he watched too many students get pulled away for their Harrowing, only to not come back. Carver took extra night shifts after a particularly graphic haranguing from Anders some months ago, and it sickened him to know the dormitories were safer for it. 

But it was paying work that would hire a dirty Fereldan refugee, and he was good at it, even though he loathed it.

He grunted and let Varric take up his pack. "Damn, it's good to be back," Carver sighed as they set up for Hightown, "even if it's Kirkwall."

"It's a shithole, sure, but at least it's our shithole, eh? Come on; ditch the rust bucket you call armor and get on down to the Hanged Man. It's Wicked Grace night, and I know you've got a fresh pocket of money to lose." Varric laughed at Carver's agonized groan. "Oh, don't give me that. If you'd just take my advice once in a while, you wouldn't lose so badly."

"The last time I took your advice, I found myself on my ass and up to my ears in dragon shit," Carver said dryly, "so excuse me for being cautious."

"I dunno, kid—it worked just fine for me. Maybe you should clean your ears more often, to better get the full experience of my melodious voice."

Carver shoved him, and Varric laughed again. It was a pleasant sound, at least, and it wasn't as sharp as it used to be, not as grating when directed his way. Maybe it was just him, or maybe it was all of them, but it felt like progress. The thought was a comforting warmth against the chilly air.

They gossipped—well, Varric did, in that way of his where he makes you feel like he's doing you a favor for telling you something you'd find on the street a half-pace away. Soon enough, the arbor gate of the Amell estate loomed tall over them. 

"Home, sweet home," Varric chuckled behind him. He set Carver's oiled canvas traveling bag down on the front step. "Now come down to the Hanged Man, we'll all catch up." He paused and said with a sly grin, "Merrill said she'll be there."

Carver felt himself flush red-hot in the lantern light and ducked his head. "I'll wrangle Eli and drag them with me. See you in a bit." He chucked his hand against Varric's shoulder, perhaps a touch harder than absolutely necessary, before taking up his bag and striding into the manse.

He was home now, it was safe to think of them. Merrill, Eli, Merrill, Anders, Merrill.

_Merrill, Merrill, Merrill._ His sibling and Anders could both shove it.

He waved a rushed greeting to his mother and trudged up the stairs, fighting the urge to strip away his armor with every step. Carver immediately shucked it all as soon as he entered his room; he traded it for a set of loose trousers and a tunic. He pulled on his father's furred vest, heavy and reliable with its quiet enchantments. The whole setup was familiar, comfortable. They told him he was home, far away from the stomach-turning dread that was the Gallows.

Well. Whatever. Carver had a week at home, and he wasn't going to spend it thinking about that place.

"Oi, jerkface," he called as he walked out of his bedroom and made his way down the hall to Eli's door. He knocked and spoke through the heavy oak. "You going to the tavern?"

A muffled oath and some rustling came from inside. "Carver!" Isabela cooed. "Welcome home, baby bird!"

"Oh, shove off with that," he grumbled. "Drinks?"

She laughed and came to the door, wrapped in a sheet and face flushed. "Why don't you go off without us? We'll be down in a few—"

"Twenty!" came Eli's disgruntled voice.

"—twenty minutes or so."

"Disgusting," Carver said blandly, rolling his eyes. "Don't get your happiness everywhere, it makes us all wanna gag."

"Don't worry, brother mine," Eli said, and Isabela laughed. "We'll be sure to be blissfully miserable by the time we get down there."

He snorted and turned away, shaking his head. He was glad for Eli, and for Isabela, he was—Maker knew one Hawke had to be happy in life. He would defend his sibling in everything, but did they have to be so blatantly, stupidly obvious in their affection? Gross.

Carver made his way downstairs. He had better places to be.

* * *

The walk to the Hanged Man wasn't long, and it was made infinitely better by a bundle of Orana's meat pasties sent along with him. If the basket was lighter by three, it was no one's business but his own and the Lowtown stray cats that shared the crusts with him. Carver walked into the tavern to a wave of muted recognition and made for the stairs. 

It still stung, that. The way people just lit up for Eli—_the_ Hawke, though Eli themself didn't seem to notice—whereas Carver was always in their shadow. Even the local recruits said Eli's name in hushed, almost reverent tones, asking Carver about them and their growing legend. 

Whatever. It didn't matter. Carver had his own reputation to uphold.

Carver nudged open the door to the suite with his foot. Varric met him with a hard clap to his back and took the basket from him. Everyone was all smiles and in various depths into their cups, happy to receive the gifts Carver brought. He sat and helped pass out the food.

Merrill was in the middle of a conversation with Aveline and Sebastian, gesturing wildly with her hands. She waved, distracted, and turned back to the others before snapping back to him so quickly she almost spilled her drink across the table. 

"Little Hawke!" Merrill stood, nearly toppling her chair backward, and sped around the table, stopping just short of bowling him over. Her hand reached out to brush over his bracer shyly. "I—we—oh, welcome home!"

He felt his face heat up, and his stomach flip-flopped at the sight of her smile. "Hey, Merrill," he said, willing his voice to keep steady only for it to wobble on her name. Varric laughed beside him, and Carver stole his ale in revenge, draining the mug in short order and setting it down on the table with a solid thump. "It's good to be back."

"I imagine so! The Gallows never seems a friendly place when you or Eli describes them.” Her hands fluttered, little scarred butterflies. “That makes sense, though, doesn't it? With a name like 'the Gallows' and all." Merrill trailed off, bobbing her head uncertainly. "I mean, I wouldn't want to be there, and—and you're there all the time..."

"Give him a break, Daisy. He's only home for the week, he doesn't wanna talk about work." Varric slid a fresh ale Carver's way with a smile. "He wants to lose at cards, don't you, Junior? Might actually stand a chance before Rivaini gets here."

Carver scoffed and sat at the table, tossing back a long pull of the offered drink. Merrill returned to her seat, and he could see her blush bright pink in the corner of his eye. 

"Bela cheats, I know it," he grumbled, turning back to the conversation, and Varric laughed.

Carver was glad when Varric dealt him in on the new round, and soon they began the serious business of creatively losing their coin to Varric and Fenris. At this point, he would be better off just giving them the damn money from his purse, but at least Varric always made a point of buying off every other round or two. It made the experience bearable. Somewhat.

The conversation drifted as they played the night away. Eli and Bela eventually showed up, laughing and clinging playfully to each other. It was then that the game changed, bets piling at the middle of the table with new, creative additions: an owed pot of healing salve, bet by Anders; the pick of Fenris' wine-cellar; a leatherbound journal, complete with ink and pen, courtesy of Varric. Carver, along with Aveline and Sebastian, just added more coin to the pot. The night stretched into endless rounds of cards and ale with their additions, full of laughter and old, comfortable arguments. 

"I shouldn't have drunk so much, I'm going foraging tomorrow," Merrill lamented at the end of the night, her words a bit fuzzy and slurred. "Sooo much to do!"

"Oh, we can't have you going off all alone, especially not hungover," Eli tutted. They turned a knowing look to Carver, who studiously avoided their gaze. "Why don't you go with her, Carv? Protect her from the—the—the deer and other wild animals and such?"

"Yeah, big scary deer, Hawke," Varric snorted. "You know they're only scary to you, right?"

Eli bristled, and Carver bit back a smirk at the memory as the table erupted into drunken laughter. "It was huge, thank you, and had, like, fifteen points to its antlers. They have knives made of bone on their head. You'd be scared, too!"

The laughing only got worse at Eli's protests. They ignored it. Eli turned back to Carver and smiled, too big and full to be any sort of genuine. "So it's settled, you'll go with our favorite flowery friend?"

"It's really nothing, Hawke," Merrill scolded, but the effect was lost with the way she blushed and warbled out the words. "I can take care of myself in the woods for a few days, I'm good at that!"

Carver looked from Merrill's pink face to Eli's own. There was something he was missing, wasn't there? Eli wore that smarmy face they got whenever they thought they'd outsmarted or outplayed him, but he couldn't see how this time.

"Sure," he said slowly. Carver narrowed his eyes suspiciously at Eli before glancing back to Merrill. She looked like she was going to die as she slumped down upon the stone table, and he watched, confused, as Isabela cackled and rubbed her shoulder.

"Great!" Eli's clapping once again caught his attention. "Just great. It'll be fun, I'm sure. Just like old times."

Fenris gave a derisive scoff over his tankard of wine, which made Merrill hiccup out a soft wail. Bela only laughed harder and draped herself across Merrill's back. Aveline shook her head in muted exasperation, and Sebastian only pinched the bridge of his nose before gathering up the cards strewn over the table.

"Just like old times," Carver muttered, finishing his ale.


	2. Chapter 2

"You don't have to come. I mean, if you don't want to. You don't have much time to spend in town, and I'm sure you didn't plan on spending most of a week in the middle of the woods…"

Carver nursed his mug of strong tea and took the pastry Merrill offered. He glanced back at his pack, which was so lovingly, and thus suspiciously, packed by his sibling and Isabela. She swore it had everything he needed, that she made sure of it.

"Don't worry," he said, only half a groan. Was the sunshine always so bright in the morning? He emptied his mug and poured another from the kettle Merrill had thoughtfully prepared. "Not like I have anything better to do this week."

She stilled, and he mentally kicked himself.

He could have just as easily said something like _"Sure, Merrill, I have a full week of free time, let's go do whatever you'd like,"_ or _"it beats being at home with the lovebirds."_ Even something simple, like _"I like the woods"_ would have been better. But no, he had to go and hurt her feelings, like an asshole.

Shit, what a way to start the day. He wanted to spend time with her, he did. Carver had angled for any time with her he could get almost since the day they'd met... but Merrill was a friend—and a mage. Carver had been a templar now for nearly a year and a half. He had long accepted nothing coming out of the trepidatious crush he'd harbored; she was a good friend, and that was enough.

But damn. Of all the ways to ruin this rare and impromptu stretch of alone time with Merrill, Carver didn't expect "complaining and hungover while still at her house" to be it.

"Oh," was all she said softly.

Carver scowled into his tea.

"Lucky me, then, I guess, that you have the time." Merrill belted herself into a knee-length coat and pulled a kerchief over her head, smoothing it over her hair and ears to ward off the chill of the autumn morning air. "You ready?"

He chugged his mug of too-hot tea and pulled on his traveling pack. Merrill gave him a distracted smile and strapped on her own bag, and they made their way out of the city.

* * *

She was uncharacteristically quiet on the journey. Not even her thin boots made much noise in the early morning, softly scuffing over the dirt and gravel of the Lowtown streets and then the dirt and gravel on the roads out of Kirkwall.

It didn't get much better as the day wore on. They took a bend that drew them away from the expected shadow of the Sundermount and toward the broader Vimmark peaks. Merrill frequently consulted the directions of a map taken from and tucked back into her belt. Even their lunch was a muted affair, another tin of Orana's meat pasties from the night before eaten at the edge of a small stream.

"So where, exactly, are we heading?" Carver finally asked as the sun began to set. The road was long behind them, and now they walked through a plain of hip-high grasses. Merrill stopped every few feet, pinching off flowering stems between her fingers and handing them to him to lay in one of the woven baskets strapped to her back.

"Oh, there's a grove up… well, somewhere, in the mountains." She handed him another handful of plants before taking out her map again—one of Varric's, Carver saw, familiar dense script flowing over the rolled page. Merrill's fingers walked over the thin lines; her gaze flickered from the map to the world around them and back again.

"Oh, we're closer than I thought! Look," Merrill said and turned to him, thrusting the map in his hands. She pointed out a sketched ring of trees toward the northeast. "See, here's where we want to be, and here—" she traced her fingers back along a winding path through the mountains "—is where we are."

"Merrill, this looks less like a map and more like a sketch I pawned off on Bethany to find 'buried treasure' with as a kid."

Carver's throat all but caved in as he spoke. His hands clenched at his side and threatened to crush the greens clutched in his fists. _Bethany._ He didn't talk about her in the years since… everything... and he does now? Almost two years into Templarhood?

Would she understand if she were here?

"Oh! Did she?" Her eyes were round, impossibly wide as she looked up at him. "Did you two find anything?"

"Just worms. Eli and Father used them and caught some trout. Mother nearly skinned us alive for the state of our clothes."

Merrill smiled at that, the first of the day. "That sounds fun," she said, a touch wistful. "Eli's told me about her. She sounds really lovely, I'm sure I would have liked her."

He huffed a short laugh and ignored the ache in his chest. "Yeah, I bet you would," he agreed distantly. "Why don't we— You said we're close?"

She nodded. "We're only a day or so away from the grove, I think. We should make camp here. Ooh, the stars will be so pretty, don't you think?" Merrill looked up expectantly, urging the night's stars to peek through the blazing sunset.

Carver only studied her face, tracing her small smile with his eyes. "Yeah, Merrill," he said, "yeah."

* * *

"Little Hawke?" Her hand brushed his arm, and his hair stood on end along the path of her fingertips.

Carver stirred, blinking past the siren call of sleep. He turned in his bedroll to look at her in the scant moonlight. "Yeah, Merr?"

She chuckled. "Merr. I like that." Her hand lingered where it laid on his forearm. "I wanted to say thank you for coming with me. I like having the company on these trips, and Bela's been busy lately."

"Yeah, Eli's been eating up a lot of her time, among other things."

He could hear the furrow of her brow in her voice. "...Does Isabela cook? I can't imagine her and Orana working well together…"

Carver snorted. "Maker, no. Can you imagine it? What would she even make?"

"She burnt the tea when she last stayed over," Merrill confided with a giggle. "I'm still not sure how she did that."

"A woman of many talents, surely."

"She is. Bela's my best friend, you know," she said, "and so helpful. Bela even helped me make sure I had enough room in my travel bag for my baskets when she walked me home last night! With you coming with me to help, I can gather so many more flowers and herbs!"

"Yeah, she's—" Carver stopped, suddenly fully awake, and suddenly very suspicious. "Really helpful, isn't she?"

"She is! Did she help you?"

"No—Eli did. Insisted on it, said they were soberer than me last night. I fell asleep almost as soon as we got home."

"What a helpful sibling. I wish I…" She trailed off and drummed her fingers along Carver's arm almost absentmindedly. "My family…"

Carver moved his arm to take her hand in his own. "Hey," he said, "hey. You've got us. I know it's not the same, but it's something, right?"

_Please say it's something._

"Yeah," Merrill murmured. He could just barely see the curve of her smile beside him. "I've got you, don't I?"

* * *

"—and this is halla beard, but you might know it as goat's beard," Merrill chirped from her seat on the tree branch. Carver watched while she gathered up the stringy stuff. "It's good for blood clotting and fevers and other things."

"Is it good for keeping elves from falling out of trees?" he muttered, eyeing her critically.

She turned, a confused frown on her face, and wobbled, almost pitching herself off the branch entirely. Carver tensed and readied to catch her, but she found her balance almost as quickly as she had lost it.

"What was that, Little Hawke?" she asked breathlessly.

Carver shook his head. "Nothing, Merr."

"Oh, look, the needletip berries are ready, too! Here, catch these." She dropped her current haul and stretched to pluck at the bright green branch tips around her. "These are good for food, you know," she said absently, concentrating as she climbed up the tree in search of the best of the bundled needle-like leaves. "Makes an excellent tea, or added to salads. We sometimes pickle them in vinegar with honey and water. Delicious!"

He caught the tips as she tossed them down. "Wouldn't it be better to collect more from each tree? Less climbing around and stuff."

She shook her head and dropped down from the branches. "You don't want to over-harvest," she said. "We all have to live on what the forest gives us. Taking too much from one tree or bush could hurt it."

He hummed noncommittally. Different than farming. Carver remembered working for their neighboring homestead, after his own household chores, the way that old widow Gaines would yell and remind him and Eli to harvest and weed until the bare earth showed its scars. Ah, Ferelden.

Carver rolled his shoulders as Merrill peeked into the basket, rearranging her hard-won treasures. Satisfied, she retrieved their lunch from her travel bag, neatly slicing into the hard chunks of sausage and cheese before sharing.

"I can't wait to get to the grove," she said around a mouthful of sausage. "Varric says he got the original map from one of the Sabrae hunters a while back. I want to see what's there!"

"You've never been to the place?" Carver couldn't help the nervous falling of his stomach. She'd used string to find her way around Kirkwall for years, after all, and that was in a pretty straightforwardly-built city. There were only so many ways to get lost among all those stairs. A forest was a much easier place to get turned around and lost for days.

"It's just the woods, Little Hawke. I know how to find my wa— Oh, listen, do you hear that? Sounds like a thrush!"

He shook his head as she rose to her feet and crept toward the birdsong, lunch forgotten. _Ah, Merrill,_ he thought, smiling. _Never change._

Carver watched her. She smiled, and laughed, and was animated in ways he rarely saw in Kirkwall. Rarely saw period, now, but especially in Kirkwall. She always seemed to breathe easier on the road in his memories.

"It looks like it's going to rain tonight," Merrill called over her shoulder. She pointed up through the tree canopy. "See those clouds coming in? They remind me of pregnant halla, all fat and heavy."

He squinted up at the sky and the dark cloud layer rolling in before stowing her baskets. "We should get going, then. You said we're only a couple hours away, right? Hopefully, we'll get there before the worst of it hits."

Merrill bounded over to him, a handful of pale blue blossoms in hand. She slipped them into the top basket and Carver helped her shrug back into her pack, shuffling it against her back. "What are those good for?" he asked, picking up his own bag.

"Oh! Um." She met his eyes, her own full of surprise, and looked away, a blush stealing over her face. "They, um. They're my favorite shade of blue." Merrill took a deep breath and walked further into the forest. "They remind me of your eyes," she said in a rush, not looking back.

He stood there, dumbly, hands still working on the clasps of his coat. "They what?"

* * *

They _weren't_ a mere two hours away from their destination, as luck (and a likelydefinitely skewed map) would have it. The sky dumped buckets down on their heads well into the evening and soaked them to the bone, even despite the thick canopy overhead.

They came into a small clearing—no bigger than Carver's bedroom at the estate, really, but big enough for maybe their tents and a fire, if they were careful. He scrubbed his hands down his face. "This better be it," he grumbled.

They ducked into the less-drenched shelter of a tree before Merrill carefully retrieved her map, reading by the light of a ball of magelight hovering at her shoulder. "Looks like it! We should set up camp, I don't know that we'll get anything useful done tonight. Maybe the rain will stop soon."

Carver peered up at the sky with a scowl and threw down his pack." I'll set up the tents, you check for a source of water. We can use the camp pot for rainwater if it comes down to it, I guess." Merrill created another ball of magelight and then scarpered off, shedding her pack far more gracefully than he did on her way.

"And don't fall or slip or anything!" he called after her as she disappeared into the night, only to see a blithe hand-wave in response. "Right, tents. Get a move on, Carver." He quickly untied the oilcloth coverings of their packs to retrieve the folded canvas of the tents—

And paused, brow furrowed.

No, no, no.

Carver pawed through his pack. It was big and bulky, and that weight had been reassuring up until a minute ago. He set aside a neatly-corralled expanse of canvas, wrapped alongside the ropes and short sticks that would help make up most of the frame. A bundle of cloth laid beneath it, and when he messily unwrapped it, he found Bela's hip flask, a parcel of cookies, other sundry provisions, and a note.

_"Dear Carver, get bent. Enjoy the tent! Heh, that rhymed, who’d've thought? Anyway. Love, Eli,"_ it said in blocky handwriting.

The ink dragged across the page, and a new script, light and practiced, sprawled over the page.

_"Ignore Eli, get Merrill bent, and maybe you'll both feel better. Have fun! And don't do anything I wouldn't! Rum, Bela. (Rum's better than love, don't you think? More fun, anyway.)"_

Carver crumpled the note—and its unsurprisingly juvenile sketch—in his fist and stared at the half-strewn traveling bags with growing horror-tinged embarrassment. He should have known better to assume any sort of goodness from those two, they were worse than magpies when they put their devious minds to something.

"I found a stream, just like the map said! We'll be set!"

He gurgled something in response, fist pressed to his mouth for a moment. "Good, fine, good," he called back. "Everything's good. Yep. Good, good, good." Carver mentally prepared a to-do list for the minute he got back to Kirkwall, with one highlighted, bullet-pointed item:

Absolutely _murdering_ his sibling.

"Little Hawke?"

He would deny until his dying day acknowledgment of the _squeak_ that burst from him at her silent arrival. "Everything's good!" he said in a rush. "Good, good, good."

Merrill tilted her head and looked at him, nonplussed. "Of course it is. Here, I'll help!"

Together they set up their shelter, with the only hangup being finding fallen branches long enough to use as tent poles. Carver finished up tying the last of the knots to secure the canvas as she stowed their supplies.

"I don't think Eli packed us the right tent," Merrill said from within. She poked head out through the door flaps. "It's a bit small. We'll have to snuggle."

What.

"Come on," she said when he hesitated too long. "It's cold and wet out there, and soon to be warm and a bit drier in here. I can set a rune under us and keep the tent warm through the night, don't worry! You won't freeze, I promise!"

Her earnestness brought him back to the present. Carver shook his water-drenched bangs from his eyes. "Sure, sure. Wait, you can do that?"

Merrill laughed. "Of course! Why do you think Bela always wanted to share with me when we would be on the road together? I know how to do a lot of things," she said, and her smile was a bit too sharp for her words, but he didn't have the time to puzzle it out. Merrill pulled him inside, muddy boots and all, and tied the flaps closed against the rain. Her light hovered at the peak of the tent and bathed her in soft, silvery-blue light.

"Watch," she said, before crouching down and pulling back the ground cover. Merrill sketched some design into the loamy earth, something he couldn't quite follow, and slapped her hands against it with a delighted smile. Soon enough, steam rose from the ground, drifting lazily through the air as the tent began to warm.

"....huh," was all he could say. That would have made years of adventuring with their band of misfits easier. "I figured Bela liked to share with you for, uh, other reasons," he muttered thoughtlessly, shaking his head, and he clapped his hand to his mouth when he heard the words out loud.

Merrill laughed, bright and bubbly, though, so he didn't make her mad. "Oh, she did," she agreed sagely, "but I think it was mostly because we both hate being cold. Much easier to sleep when you're warm, right? I always thought so, at least!"

….Right. Thinking about anything but that. Nope, very studiously ignoring… that.

"And the tent isn't going to catch fire or anything in the middle of the night?" he asked instead, bringing the conversation back to something safe. Like a tent fire. Like a tent fire inadvertently caused by his mage companion, who so graciously cast some sort of spell to keep them warm, for his comfort. _Great going, Carver. Way to stick your foot waaaay in there._

"Nope," she replied, thankfully oblivious to his inner monologue and unintended insult. Merrill patted the groundcover back into place and layered their bedding together into a thick pallet. "Won't get hot enough to do that. It really just takes the edge off; it's not like making a fire, more like… oh, like warming the blankets before you crawl into bed. The rune heats the earth below us to help insulate against the cold, which heats the tent a little, and our bedrolls will help trap that warmth to us. Most of the work will still be body heat, though."

"Smart." Carver turned away and began to peel off his layers. He was halfway through unbuttoning his vest when he caught her watching, unabashed. Carver blushed. "Do you mind?" he huffed.

"Hm? Oh!" She shook her head and turned her attention elsewhere. "Sorry. Modesty. What a strange idea!"

"Is it… not a thing with the Dalish?" he asked over his shoulder, hands stilled on his buttons.

"Not really." He could hear her shuffling, then the sound of wet leathers. Carver trained his eyes, both physical and imaginary, to the canvas wall ahead of him. "Everyone has a body. They're made for all sorts of things; work, play, pleasure—" Merrill's voice stumbled for a second before righting itself again "—all very natural things. Nothing I, or anyone else, haven't seen before, so why spend the energy being shy and secret about it?"

"...huh," he said, the word strangled in his throat. "Right. Well. Okay. I'm going to… get ready for bed now. So don't look."

She sighed behind him. He could swear he heard a soft _"you silly thing"_ in her gentle lilt, but a quick peek over his shoulder showed her turned toward her own wall, busy with her bedtime preparations. Carver quickly traded his soaked clothing for a light sleeping shirt and a suspiciously soft pair of pants— Bela's influence, no doubt. He scowled. Merrill's penchant for fondling soft, touchable fabrics was well known, and Bela had been trying to 'help' Carver 'woo' Merrill for ages.

He added _"murder the pirate"_ to his to-do list.

"Oooh, soft," Merrill cooed quietly, as if on cue. Carver swallowed down a sudden rush of nerves and turned to find her, fully dressed, even, clad in a light shift. Her fingers crushed the fabric, and she looked like the happiest damn person he'd ever seen at that moment. "Feel this," she insisted and closed the distance between them to thrust the material into his hands. "Isn't it so pretty?"

Carver tentatively rubbed at the fabric and found that, yes, it was delightfully soft, something like a mix of silk and the lightest cotton he had ever felt. He also found that its hemline crept up her thighs when she wound his fingers into the cloth. Carver dropped it as if scalded.

"It's really… nice," he agreed. _Like you,_ he almost said, and it was like another voice was in his mouth trying to come out. _It suits you, now please take it off._

Fucking Maker, the earth could swallow him whole anytime now.

She smiled, and for a horrifying moment, he worried he had spoken it all out loud. "It was a gift," she said, "from—"

"—from Bela," he supplied with a groan, to which she nodded. Of course, it was. Of course! "I'm going to die," Carver muttered under his breath when she stepped away.

"What was that?"

"I said I'm going to bed, goodnight." Carver all but dove into the combined bedroll. He rolled to his side and situated himself to give as wide a berth as possible for her. They'd shared close quarters before but never like this, never just the two of them in such a small area.

_Don't make it fucking weird,_ he told himself.

Despite his efforts, the bed was still somehow small enough that she plastered herself along his back after extinguishing her light. "We'll have to snuggle," Merrill reminded him, words muffled against his shoulder. "Body heat."

"Right. Yeah. Snuggling." His heart pounded like a war drum in his chest. "Should I roll over?"

"If you want."

"Okay…" They shuffled until he was on his back, and Merrill curled up into his side like she belonged there.

_Blood mage, blood mage,_ his heartbeat reminded him. The warning had been loud in his mind before, but now it was new once more, a vision of Knight-Commander Stannard's rage-mottled face blistering into his mind's eye.

_"Remember to uphold the duties and values of the Order, even on your days off,"_ Rutherford's phantom voice urged him.

Carver Hawke, who had shielded mages from Templars all his life, wrapped his arm around Merrill's thin shoulders with a mental _fuck you_ to the Gallows and let the sound of her pleased sigh send him to sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

Ozone burned like acid in his nostrils as he jolted, a half-strangled shout stuck in his throat. Already the dream was slipping away, just flashes and impressions—blood and bone, an oppressive wall of force battering against him. Trapped, walled off, restrained. Bright green eyes, crying, fading. Gone.

Merrill blinked at him like a cat as she hovered above him. "Carver?" The sound distorted around a yawn. Her fingers curled into his tunic, where she clutched at his shoulders. "Wha's wrong?"

His heart stammered in his chest, blood thrumming at the pulse point in his neck. Merrill was too kind, too warm, too close. Was this one of those dreams that layered? He'd had them before, had woken from the horrors of the Fade countless times only to find reality to be as dream-tinged as ever. It had gotten worse after pledging himself to the Templars and taking his first draught of lyrium, putting himself closer to the Fade with every infusion. It could happen at any time now. 

He shivered and pulled Merrill close without conscious thought, wrapping his arms around the narrow planes of her back. He focused on her heat, the way she always seemed too warm for her thin frame. The way her hair tickled his nose. The gnarled root that prodded at his left hip. Carver took a deep breath and counted—in, two, three, four; out, two, three, four—just as Anders had taught Eli, and just how Eli had taught Carver. If he could only calm the shuddering of his nerves, he could focus.

"It's a dream, I guess," he muttered against her temple. Carver felt the sick flutter of his pulse in his belly. Would he be able to tell if this was just his imagination? Would he recognize a demon if it slept in his arms? "It was just a dream."

Her fingers wound themselves into the sleep-smushed waves of his hair. "Dreams can be scary, but you're okay. I'm here, right?" Merrill chuckled, low and husky, her breath puffing along the column of his throat. "The Fade responds to power and will. I will protect you, Little Hawke."

His skin tingled at the weight of her words, and he could swear he felt her magic in them. Merrill's hair smelled like elfroot and something else, something smokey and herbal, like the Nevarran tea Varric got him addicted to last month. He allowed himself to breathe it in for a moment. It did nothing for his nerves. "We should—we should probably get up if we're awake," he croaked. _Please be awake,_ he thought.

Merrill only moved to turn her head and peer vaguely skyward, as if she could pierce the leafy canopy through the canvas ceiling. "Still early," she huffed. "Remind me to find some bitter-blossoms. I told my neighbor I'd bring her some if I found any. Mm. You should take some, too."

"Yeah?" Carver craned his head to peek at her and found Merrill's bright green eyes peering back. "What's that good for?"

She yawned and settled back against his shoulder. "Dreams," she said with a sleepy snuffle. Merrill hummed a tune under her breath, and Carver couldn't fight the way his limbs slowly relaxed, the way his heart calmed to the soothing touch of her hand on his chest.

He couldn't fight anything. It was the last panicked thought that raced through his mind before the blackness of sleep took him once more.

* * *

"I don't think I can tell these apart," Carver complained. "You keep telling me these are different, but I just don't see it."

Merrill laughed. He loved it when she laughed, even when it was aimed at him. "I'll show you again," she promised. "Look out below!" A shower of needles heralded her quick—and almost violent—descent from the tree.

He held out the two sprays of red flowers he had been examining, each a cluster of tiny blossoms on thin stems rising from a single stalk. "They're the same, aren't they?" he asked. "You gave me a trick question, admit it."

She smiled and pointed at the one in his left hand. "This one's what we're looking for. You can tell, it's more woody and sturdy than the other, and it's all red, not red and yellow flowers."

Carver frowned and examined them closer. "These are barely yellow." He snorted, shaking the offending flower. "So, what's wrong with this one, then?" 

"The red and yellow one is very poisonous."

He dropped them both like rocks. "You could have told me that earlier!"

"I did! I said that we want the—"

"'—the red ones, so please go pick a few from each bush, and don't worry, half of them are going to be toxic,'" he supplied in a high, mocking voice. Carver eyed her smiling face with suspicion. "What?"

"You're just so—so silly!" Merrill laughed, and he felt his annoyance melt away. "I don't sound anything like that!"

He blushed and looked away, smushing the poisonous flower with the toe of his boot. "Well, whatever," he grumbled. "How poisonous are they, anyway?"

"Don't eat any," was all she said before clamoring up another tree. "Oh, and don't lick your hands before washing them!"

Carver watched the branches shake as Merrill made her way, following below her with one of her baskets. He fought off a yawn and shook his head. The morning hadn't been any better after truly waking up; Merrill had already gotten up, humming to herself outside the tent by the time Carver awoke. His rest had been fitful. He wasn't unconvinced his dreams were playing tricks on him, offering warm touches and soft sighs, and murmuring promises in the dark.

_Blood mage,_ something in him warned. Carver risked his knighthood by being in proximity to her, which he minded only a little, but it still was an incessant worry in the back of his mind. The lyrium that lay wrapped up in his pack weighed on him, too; Carver had another day or so before the shakes started, having learned to spread out his doses as much as possible. 

"Uh, Merr," Carver called, "I, uh, question. Can you feel lyrium? Is it a mage thing?"

The leaves rustled above him. "A what?"

"I said, can you feel lyrium? Or, maybe," Carver hedged, fingers clenching around the basket's wicker rim. "Maybe what I mean is… can you sense templars?"

The movement stilled. Silence fell in the gaps. "No?" came Merrill's eventual reply, hesitant. "I don't—I don't think so? Coming dow—_oh!"_

A branch cracked and sent Merrill spilling in a flutter of leaves. With hardly a thought, Carver dropped the basket. He meant to catch her, but she flailed as she fell; Merrill managed to kick him square in the chest and sent them both careening to the ground. He still broke her fall, at least. Carver took that as a meager win.

They sprawled atop moss that was still full of yesterday's rain, squishy and cold beneath them. Merrill shook herself like a dog. "That was scary," she muttered, voice wavering. Her hands rose to his face to cradle Carver's temples. "Are you hurt?"

"Just my pride, I think." He squeezed his eyes tight and performed a quick check, wiggling his toes and fingers. Each success loosened the tension in his chest. He'd seen a man wreck his back after a fall, leaving him all but crippled and discharged to some remote monastery somewhere. 

When Knight-Commander Stannard had commended his recruit class for committing their lives to the Chantry, Carver hadn't taken it at face value then—but he did in that split second.

"Yeah," he finally said, satisfied and worried all the same, "just my pride."

"Well!" She laughed, the sound high and slightly nervous to his ears, "I don't know how to kiss that better, so I guess you'll just have to be fine!" Merrill rolled to her feet and offered her hand. Carver eyed it dubiously before rising, trading only the barest of his weight on their clasped grip.

They were standing too close by the time he found his feet, just a breath between them. He could feel the heat that radiated from Merrill like she was a brazier, a mage thing, he assumed.  
Carver knew he ran hot nowadays, after taking the lyrium. She blinked up at him, their hands still held tight. Her eyes were such a bright green, like—like leaves, but maybe that was a racist idea. Carver was a little lightheaded at the thought. She deserved flattery, but he never was good at it, and surely it was a bad idea, anyway.

The moment stretched. Carver couldn't look away. A smear of sap smudged her cheek, right along the lines of her tattoo, and without thinking, he raised his hand to wipe it with his thumb.

Merrill leaned into the touch, rubbing her cheek into his palm. Carver stared at the width of his hand compared to her face. Maker, she was so small, so tiny, but she never seemed it. Merrill was just… so much. _What,_ he wasn't sure, but she was.

"It's all right, you know," Merrill murmured, her eyes never straying from his own. Her words rang like a bell despite her whisper. "Even you can be happy once in a while. It won't kill you."

A noise punched out of his chest, and, just like that, the moment was lost. Carver dropped his hand and stepped back, turning away from the visible disappointment that flashed across her expressive face.

"I, uh, thanks," he said, shoving his hands in the pockets of his vest.

Maker, that was inappropriate. That was wholly inappropriate. He was a templar, and she was a mage, and—and Merrill was his _friend,_ no matter the wibbly quality his stomach took on whenever she was around. She asked him for help, and he was supposed to be helpful, not—

Merrill sighed, soft, and turned to another tree without a word, leaping up into its branches in an acrobatic twist that would have made even Father green with envy. 

Guilt settled low and heavy in his stomach, but he couldn't figure out what for. He chalked it up to just another day in the life of Carver Hawke and set about to recollecting the foraged plant matter that had spilled from the baskets when they fell.

* * *

The rest of the day passed much like the one before. Merrill identified plants, showed him what she wanted, and he would search the forest floor while she picked from the trees, then they'd meet in the middle. Her laughter had returned shortly after it had fled, and he was immensely grateful for it.

A Merrill who didn't smile or laugh was a terrifying, sunburst-shaped thought, and it only reminded him of the genuine dangers present to them both.

He put the maudlin thought away for dinner. A trap set that morning yielded a pair of plump rabbits, and they had become the subject of a disagreement on how best to season while Carver stripped and prepared them for roasting.

"You see, if you wrap it up—" Merrill pantomimed wrapping the animals like a present, the movements broad and exaggerated "—you can roast it in its own juices. It's how we would do them around at home, wrapped in leaves and clay."

He pulled a face. "And how do you suppose you'd do that here?" Carver waved to the woods around them with his knife, inadvertently dripping blood down his knuckles. "We're in the middle of nowhere."

Merrill looked around, a frown creasing her face. "Hm. Well, maybe…" She flitted to the trees, studying the brush and surrounding flora. "I'm sure there are some good herbs here, too."

Carver shrugged and returned to his task, taking care not to nick the fur more than he needed to; these rabbits would make a nice pair of mittens if he were careful, or maybe a pair of earmuffs.

He stopped at the thought, looking from the carcasses to Merrill and back. Maybe he could get Eli to gift them to her. That'd be—that would be appropriate, right? She and Eli were friends. That would work. Merrill didn't have to know they were from him, and he could still make sure she didn't freeze her fingers or ears. That could be enough for him, couldn't it?

It would have to be. 

Carver turned back to the rabbit at hand and pulled the fur off, setting it as neatly as he could on the log beside him before finishing his preparations. The next went as quickly as the first, and soon enough, he had their dinner ready for roasting.

"D'you find anything over there?" he asked. Carver snorted when Merrill came back to the fire with her hands full of herbs and mushrooms.

"I did!" Merrill shoved the bounty in his face and Carver made a show of inspecting it all, even though he was sure they both knew she was the expert. Farmboy all he was, he wasn't the foraging type, not the way Merrill was. "With these and the salt from our rations kits, these will be the best rabbits you've ever tasted, I promise!"

Her earnestness never failed to make him smile. "Rabbit's pretty good on its own," he snorted, even as he made room for her at the makeshift kitchen he'd rigged from a mostly flat rock and a log to serve as a bench. "Think that'll all survive spit-roasting?"

She nodded, then winced, reconsidering. "Well, I think so. We'll never know until we try."

"Good thing we're adventurous." He traded her the rabbits for the mushrooms and made quick work of cleaning them, setting them on a flat, hot rock at the edge of the fire at her instruction.

Merrill had already threaded the seasoned rabbits on their roasting pole by the time he finished and laid them out over the fire. A quick sprinkle of herbs dusted the mushrooms and she sat back, satisfied.

"I do love a good rabbit stew," she said wistfully. Merrill dug into her baskets and began laying out bundles of flowers and herbs around the fire. "That's something I miss about Ferelden, you know. They were fat and happy, and so big! How were they always so big? They tasted so much better than the ones here outside Kirkwall."

Carver checked the sky; it was still light out, though dusk was falling through the canopy. He took his pile of rabbit furs and began scraping them clean. "I miss not having everything want to kill me. There's a Maker-damned Varterral up that mountain—" he gestured vaguely in the direction he hoped was the Sundermount before turning back to the hides "—and dragons in the mine. There's Carta, and Coterie, and all the rest of those stinking gangs who'll gut you as soon as look at you."

Once he started, Carver couldn't stop, the words falling out of him without reason, his voice hitching higher and faster. "And the harbor smells like fish and sewage, and Darktown is disgusting and not fit for habitation. Neither is most of Lowtown, and definitely not the Alienage, but no one cares, because it's just poor humans and elves who live there. And there's the insanity of the Gallows, don't even get me started on that, I can't—I just can't even begin—and even the air's not right here, and—"

Merrill laid her hand on his wrist, her thumb rubbing gentle, tentative circles on his skin and jolting him out of his thoughts. Carver's fingers twitched and he only belatedly caught himself from dropping his knife to the ground, letting it clatter to the makeshift table instead.

Maker, her eyes were just… so green, so bright where they smiled up at him.

"Little Hawke," she said, "tell me about Lothering?"

The hills on the outskirts of the village flooded his mind. The lake. The nearby forest. The long, vast stretch of pastureland, where he and Eli would drive their neighbor's sheep during the golden summer months. The gnarled apple tree that stood on their little property where he and Bethy had played from the first fingers of dawn to the languid stretch of dusk during the summers. 

There was a patch of grass the two of them had played in. Carver and Bethany would pretend to be princesses and princes, making new laws and founding new countries. Sometimes they were adventurers finding treasures. Some days they simply would make mud pies from the dirt. It didn't matter, as long as they had each other.

Carver remembered the ways the floorboards would squeak on nights Eli snuck out to watch the sky, waiting for the storms to roll in. He saw the way the light filtered through the wooden shutters of the main room, where Mother would mend clothes and earn extra money from housewives who had lesser skill in the trade than she.

Carver saw the little shrine they made for Father: an urn, a sketch at Bethany's hand, a book of stories read to the children over the years, a lock of his hair. They had left him behind to the Blight and the darkspawn, just one more Hawke lost to the demons from below.

He didn't realize he was crying until Merrill pulled him against her side, her arms wrapping around his ribs. Carver let himself slump into her, and she took his weight gladly. Merrill's breath rustled his hair, where she cooed soft, unknown words against his crown.

"I miss it." He stared blankly into the surrounding forest. "I miss Ferelden so much, Merr. Eli and Mother pretend that everything is fine here, that Kirkwall is home, but it just isn't, and no one understands why I hate it here—and whenever I try to talk about it, all of Eli's friends make fun of me for being homesick after all these years. I was in the army," he said, the words hollow." I was at Ostagar, fought the darkspawn with my own two hands. I—I love my country, was willing to die for it. Wanted to, even, if it came down to it. But no one gets it. No one talks about it."

"I understand." Her voice was small, reedy, and he twisted his head a little to see her own cheeks gleam wetly. She smiled down at him and sniffled, one hand rising to pet at his hair. "I miss home, too."

Carver shifted to snake his arm around her waist, pulling them upright. She tucked into him gladly and pressed her cheek to his chest. "Tell me about it?" he asked hoarsely.

She shook her head. "Maybe later," Merrill sighed. "It would be a shame to let our dinner burn."

They sat huddled together in the blooming twilight, quiet and still. Carver waited until the last second he could comfortably spare to turn the rabbits. Couldn't let them burn and waste all that work. She looked at him with something soft in her eyes when he turned back, and Carver hesitated.

But she just gave a small smile and patted the log beside her, and he returned. She nestled under his arm like he'd never moved, like whatever spell that had grown around them hadn't broken when reality encroached.

Evening came on, quiet as a mouse, and they ate in comfortable silence after she declared their meal ready. Merrill pressed into his side, making happy little noises as she ate.

They were a mismatched pair, he thought; human and elf, templar and mage. One always had power over the other. It wasn't fair, and it wasn't right, and it was the way of the world, and he hated it. His father had taught him a lot over the years, but maybe the most important lessons were on power and authority, on how Carver had to be a good man because there were plenty of bad ones already. How he had to shelter and protect those in need because other people would take advantage of the needy. He was gifted by the Maker with strength and a big heart, Father would tell him again and again, and they were their own kind of magic. Carver had a duty to use them to help and never to hurt.

There were so many reasons he shouldn't have been out here. Not when just the thought of Merrill made something bloom in him, something sappy and warm and disgustingly sweet... but when Merrill smiled at him, mouth unrepentantly slick and shiny with rabbit fat, Carver wished that the divide between them wasn't so sharp.

He told her about Lothering and focused on the ember of warmth that still lingered in his heart for home.


	4. Chapter 4

Merrill lay plastered against his side, her head pillowed on his arm, half-awake and quiet in the dark of the tent. It really was a small shelter, and the bed even smaller. He wasn't entirely convinced of her argument on needing to conserve body heat, but it was pleasant, once he got used to the idea.

Nerve-wracking, too. He didn't know what to do with his hands, literally or metaphorically.

It was always easy for Eli to make friends, and then to make _friends._ Bethany, his twin and closest to him in all things, was definitely the easier one to talk to and get to know. She managed to befriend people, even though she had admitted to Carver that she was always nervous, always waiting for something terrible to happen. Someone would notice Father's talents with animals, or Bethy's affinity for fire, or the way Eli always knew when a storm was going to hit. Someone would find them out and take them away, or worse.

But Carver never let it. Carver had stood as a lookout for his family for so long that he sometimes wondered, in the middle of the night, if maybe that was the problem: if he'd spent so long watching them that he never had time for anyone else. He put himself between the world and his father and siblings since the day he figured out there was a reason to do so, and no one else came close until he was called to the King's service.

That level of introspection never paid off, so he'd grab a drink and think of something else, something that didn't remind him of home and Ferelden and the green, green hills of Lothering. His friends—Eli's friends, anyway—were right: Carver didn't do well with looking inward. Give him something to hit and a reason to do it, that's his talent, that's his skill.

There was still a flask of something drinkable in their packs, but getting up and distracting himself meant jostling Merrill, so that just left him with his meandering thoughts.

Merrill sometimes snored in her sleep, soft, little chirruping sounds on every exhale. That was a new knowledge he could not un-know, thanks to this trip. He didn't know what to do with that tidbit. Her smile was wide and beautiful, and she had a gap on her right side that only showed when she grinned as big as the sea. 

That information was new, too. Carver had never seen it before, and it made his stomach wobble. Carver had known her for years now; he'd camped with her, played cards with her, drunk themselves stupid under the light of the moons. Carver had imagined kissing her in every shadow and winding alley for the last three years, and still, he'd never seen her smile so big as in the last three days.

Her soft voice broke the silence that had brewed for hours, settling as they bedded down but couldn't sleep. "We had a tree, too. Tamlen, Lyna, and I. We were mostly inseparable for a long time." 

He hummed something he hoped was vaguely encouraging, and she continued, gentle in the night air. 

"They were older than me, but Tamlen's mother had taken me in as a child. He and Lyna let me play with them between lessons, even when I became Marethari's First. We would pretend to save each other from dragons and sylvans, and we would practice hiding from mabari and their humans. Lyna taught me how."

Carver's stomach twisted. No wonder Merrill only ever came by the house when Eli and Trouble were out or met them all in public places where the dog wasn't allowed. She even declined invitations for excursions on which Hawke was accompanied by Trouble, a pattern he only recognized now. "I didn't know." A sense of horror grew in his chest. "The dog thing."

She nodded, the slow movement scraping his shirt along his chest where they touched. "Fereldans and their dogs," she laughed weakly. "They're so big and scary. I don't understand the appeal." She hesitated, then ducked her face into his chest. "I don't understand a lot of things, I think."

Carver turned the phrase over in his mind. It felt like a trap. Like something he should know already, but he couldn't see what kind of revelation, exactly, he had been led to. He let it lie for a moment before whispering, somewhere on the edge of curious and desperately not wanting to know, "Like what?"

Her fingers bunched in the fabric over his abdomen. It sent a lick of heat through him, sure as if she'd burnt him with a gout of flame. "People say things they don't mean to hide what they do. Like it's a game where everyone knows how to play, except me—but no one tells me the rules, do they? 'What's so funny?' I ask, and Bela laughs and tells me she'll tell me when I'm older, but I'm not a child. I know when they talk about dirty things, just not why they don't say it plain."

Carver almost swallowed his tongue by the time Merrill took an indignant breath. She rose, sitting up and pulling the blankets with her. "And everyone cheats at cards, except Aveline and Sebastian, but no one says anything, even though cheating isn't fair. But why? I don't know that, either. Friends aren't supposed to cheat, even at silly things, even if it all evens out again at the end. But why don't they get in trouble?"

"I wonder the same thing," Carver muttered under his breath. He threw his forearm over his eyes. "Sometimes, I hate playing with everyone."

"And Varric calls me Daisy, even though it's a silly thing, and daisies aren't even my favorite flower! And he never told me why he thought it fit, just that it did, and now that's what Varric calls me, even though I like my own name better, but he doesn't listen. And you, you just—" Merrill cut off with a muted gasp, her breath coming quick and heavy like she had run up the whole of the Sundermount.

Carver waited, stunned in the dark, wishing he could see her face better. But maybe it was just as well; he was never really good at reading people, not in the way Eli was. Merrill was camping with the wrong Hawke, Carver was sure of it, and it was highlighted in the way her shoulders tensed when he sat up and tentatively reached for her.

"I… what?"

She shuffled, bending forward to hug her knees to her chest. "Sometimes you say the nicest things, Little Hawke," Merrill said. Her voice was muffled slightly, and Carver leaned forward to hear her better. "You—the way you look at me, it's so kind and sweet, just like you are, when you're not grumpy. But then you look away and don't see me anymore, and sometimes you look back. I get so dizzy, waiting to see what you'll do. Sometimes it feels like a fancy dance, and everyone knows it but me, and they all laugh when I fall down."

"Merrill—"

"And I don't even know! I don't even know if that's what this is. Bela thinks so, and Eli thinks so, and everyone else thinks so, but you don't say anything, and really, isn't that what matters? Everyone except you treats me like a child, like I don't know anything about sex or love or relationships, but I'm an elf, not a child. Sometimes you say the nicest things, and I don't know what to do with that."

It felt like a stab to the gut. Carver's cheeks flared hot and red in the dark. "I… I don't mean to make you sad," he said dumbly. This was way over his head. He sighed and ran his hands through his hair, tugging lightly. "I'm sorry. I'm not good at making friends or being around people. I'm sure you've noticed that by now."

Merrill brought to life a tiny mote of magelight and let it float to the apex of the tent. It cast her in stark relief when she turned to him, her huge eyes catching in the dim light.

"You don't make me sad," she said fervently, "you make me so happy. So happy, Little Hawke, all the time. You walk me home when you can, even though I hardly ever get lost anymore. You bring me tea sometimes. When I stop to pet the stray cats when we're out with the others, you always wait for me. You sharpened my knives, even though they make you nervous, even though I'm a—a blood mage."

Her breath caught in her throat, a barely-audible hitch. "Last winter you got me a coat so nice I almost didn't wear it because I didn't want it to get it dirty. Kirkwall is such a dirty town, you know. Bela told me that all things break eventually, so I might as well wear it and be warm. And I did, and I thought of you every time, and prayed to the Creators that they keep you safe, even though you're not an elf."

She was just so damn earnest. It was going to be the death of him. Carver swallowed thickly around the lump that threatened to block his throat. "Merr…"

Merrill only scooted closer, their knees touching. "And you come with me on foraging trips, even though you don't have a lot of time at home anymore. That means a lot to me. More than I can say. I just…"

"...yeah?"

She squeezed her eyes tight, the motion squinching up her tattoos, and opened them again to find his hand before looking back at him. "You're one of my best friends, Carver. I just want to know you're happy, too." Her voice wobbled, and she gave a weak smile. "I would be glad for that."

He could barely breathe. It was… surreal, the way she looked at him, light shining in her eyes. Without his permission, his hands reached up to frame her cheeks. Her eyes fluttered a moment, but she kept them trained on him, rising on her knees until they were almost of a height.

Carver's gaze flickered from her lips to her eyes, and his stomach gave a frightening lurch. "I don't know what to say, except that I am. Happy, I mean," he said quickly. They were so close he could feel the soft caress of her breath on his skin. He brushed a thumb idly over her cheek. "I…"

Merrill blushed, and the hammering of his pulse pushed all logical thoughts out of his head.

He closed the scant distance and kissed her, soft as the relieved sigh that caught between them.


	5. Chapter 5

Carver had a rough list of his favorite things in life, experiences he hoarded in a locked silverite-banded treasure chest in some dark recess of his mind. 

It held his most precious memories. The way Father said his name when he told a young Carver of the good templar he had met, full of respect and awe. Mother's face on the afternoon of his thirteenth name-day, when she met him for the midday meal with a trencher of honeyed hearth cakes scattered with sun-warmed berries and topped with fresh cream from the Presleys' cow. The sound of Bethany's laughter, free and light with a surprised snort at the end, which never failed to make her laugh even harder. 

It held the sunlight that filtered through the trees when Eli had taken Carver aside. They explained—in stilted, nervous words—how unlike other kids in the village they were, being neither girl nor boy. They wanted Carver to understand that, they still were the same sibling he'd loved, and that Eli didn't love Carver any less just because things were different. If Eli kept a similar box, Carver hoped the answering hug he had given lived safely hidden there, too.

The box held other things, too. The scent of freshly cut hay and alfalfa from the fields, the taste of fall's first apples, the buzz of nearby beehives on the outskirts of a small village in the middle of the Fereldan highlands. A memory of honing and oiling his first broadsword, a gift from a templar at the Lothering Chantry after apparently seeing Carver practice with a stick longer than he was tall. He had taken it reluctantly, only remembering propriety and thanking the man as an afterthought. Carver had dedicated himself to using it to protect his family. It was only steel, after all. Who it came from was of lesser consequence than how he used it going forward. 

And now, Carver thought distantly, he could add more to his secret treasure trove. 

Merrill hummed into his mouth and clutched at his shoulders, shuffling closer. Carver threaded his hands into her hair; a flare of heat burned up his spine at the way she groaned. He used the new leverage to tilt her head for a better angle and sank into her touches greedily.

She breathed his name into his mouth, and he'd never heard a lovelier sound. 

His skin lay scorched where she pawed at his chest, his shoulders, his back. Merrill fisted her hands into the fabric of his shirt and pulled herself into his lap. Carver groaned at the weight of her, the warmth of her, and found his hands sliding down Merrill's thin nightgown to map the lines of her back. 

_Blood mage, blood mage,_ a tiny voice in the back of his mind whispered to him again. It took on shades of Rutherford, not just the familiar tones of his father's voice, and his fingers bunched in her nightgown in deliberate ignorance of the warning. 

This was Merrill, and Carver knew what she was about. He trusted her implicitly. 

But his trust in himself was less reliable, and he reluctantly pulled away, breathing heavily and pressing his brow to her own. "Merrill," he murmured, his hands still tight at her back. "I've got to—wait." 

"Carver…?"

He shook his head and squeezed his eyes shut, just as Father had taught Eli and Bethany when they were young. There were tricks, he had said, variations on an easy tool to help know if you were dreaming. Dreams weren't supposed to let you get hurt, not for real, Father had said, so most people could tell if they were dreaming if they pinched themselves or held their breath. If it hurt, you were most likely awake, and for non-mages, that could be proof enough. 

"This is going to sound weird right now, but I need you to do me a favor." He blushed at her laughter, light with a slight air of confusion. "Well, not like _that_, but—I just…" He trailed off. "Just, could you poke me or pinch or something?" 

He could all but hear the furrowed brow in her words. "...is this a sex—" 

"No, no, no," he sputtered. He could feel his face growing hotter. "It's not a _thing_ thing, it's just… Could you do it, then I'll explain. Okay? I just, you know, can't see or feel it coming for it to work." 

Merrill gave a disbelieving snort. "Okay," she said. "Here goes." Her hand dragged heavy, soothing lines down his forearm, fingers threading through the thin hair there. "Like this?" 

"Not quite," he rasped; it felt really, _really good_, but wasn't what he was aiming for. 

She moved to run her nails down his chest, leaving light scratches in their wake. "Or this?" 

The husky tone of her voice sent something dripping white-hot into his belly and he shivered. It was a battle to keep his eyes closed. His hands dropped to her waist and squeezed, drawing a soft gasp from her. "Kinda. Closer, at least." 

"Maybe this…" 

He yelped and opened his eyes; a burst of pain stung at the shell of his ear, blooming in a confused battle against the way she pressed warm and heavy into him. Merrill had risen on her knees and caught his earlobe sharply between her teeth. She nibbled delicately there, before the sting could resolve itself on his stretched out nerves.

It was—holy Maker, it was _great._

A shudder traipsed up his spine. Carver all but crushed her against him, pulling her flush against his body with no resistance. A low groan punched out from his chest before he could stop it. 

"Oh!" Merrill shivered, leaning against the strength of his arms across her back. Her worried gaze studied his face. "Did I hurt you? I didn't mean to!" 

"No," he said, the word breaking with a squeak. Carver cleared his throat and tried again. "No, I just—wasn't expecting that, which was the point. Yes. Thank you." 

She bit her lip and threaded a hand into his hair. "What was it for, if not—" He blushed, and she blushed, and she wobbled before carrying on, "—if not for _things_?"

Carver groaned. "It's dumb." 

"...you said you'd tell me. So…?" 

He snorted. "Have you—well, you probably already deal with stuff like this, being a mage and all." She nails scratched at the hair at Carver's nape, and he pressed his head into the crook of her shoulder. "Sometimes, I feel like I'm dreaming. Sometimes I can't tell the real world from the Fade, and so I have to check." 

Carver hesitated, letting the way her hand moved in his hair lull him into security. This was Merrill. He trusted Merrill. "Sometimes, I dream about you, and I just want this to be real," he muttered. 

"You… you dream about… me?" Her breath hitched, fanning into the unruly waves of his hair. 

"I… yeah." In for a copper, in for a sovereign. He lifted his head to look at her, to study the way her tattoo framed her eyes. "I do. Probably more often than I shou—_mmph!"_

Her hand fisted in his hair and brought him crashing into her with no finesse. She all but crawled into his chest cavity, the way she leaned into him. Her teeth caught on his lower lip and he groaned. Merrill swept her tongue over his lip before slipping inside with a grateful, giddy noise. 

Carver overcorrected, and Merrill squirmed; together, they fell, Carver landing flat on his back, dazed. She braced herself on her hands above him. 

"I dream about you, too," she said, nodding quickly. "All the time. But mages can control our dreams, and so—Oh, _Carver_." Merrill peppered his face with quick, barely-there kisses. "You were always gone, and I missed you so much. And Sebastian—" 

Carver groaned. "Whatever it is, I don't think I want to know," he groused beneath her. "No offense to him, but I'd much rather not have Sebastian in the middle of what we're doing." 

Merrill shook her head. "He said—oh, he was trying to be nice, I'm sure—but he said that I shouldn't want you anymore. That you were sworn to the Circle and how it would be dangerous, and… and…" 

"I would _never_ hurt you, Merrill." Something raised its ferocious head in his chest, dark-eyed at the way her own gaze glittered. His hands tightened at her hips. "I wouldn't let you get hurt, no matter what anyone said." 

"I know," she said softly. Merrill fit her palm against his cheek and brushed her thumb over his skin. "He told me it would be dangerous for you. So I dreamed instead." 

"I—oh." Carver swallowed thickly. "And—and you can control your dreams." She nodded. "How—how long?" 

Merrill blushed and looked away. "Since you left." She took in a shaking breath and let it out on a soft huff before turning back, looking at him from under long, sooty lashes. "Before then, too."

He swore beneath her, his heart turning erratic somersaults behind his ribs. "I'm an idiot, aren't I?"

Merrill laughed. "Is this a question where I'm supposed to agree with you or disagree? I'm never good at these." 

"I'll take that as a 'yeah, Carv, you're a big fucking idiot.'" He snorted and scrubbed his hands down his face while she slid to the ground, fitting herself neatly into the crook of his arm. "I can't—I can't think when I'm around you," he admitted. Carver frowned, reconsidering. "Or in general, when it comes to you. When I leave the Gallows, I can't think of you until I'm home, because if I do, they might find you. They're crazy enough to do it, and I need you safe. I need you here."

"Oh." The word left her on a wounded sigh. "Carver…" 

"And I just—sometimes I worry," he barrelled on. Carver shifted to lay on his side, his arm pillowing Merrill's head and his free hand drumming nervously at his hip. "I'll wake up, and I'm not done dreaming, and sometimes you're there… but then I wake up for real, and I'm in my bunk at the Gallows, alone. Not that I want you at the Gallows, anything but that... I worry that I want you _so much_ in those moments. In all moments." 

Carver chuckled grimly and stared at the canvas wall over Merrill's head. "A demon's going to try to eat my guts, and all it'll have to do is pretend to be you, and I'd let it, I just know it." 

A distressed whine pulled from Merrill and she clutched her arms around him as best as she could manage. "Don't say things like that," she admonished into his chest. "Don't tease the Dread Wolf like that. Do you want him to—" 

She cut off. Carver peeked down to find something conflicted and embarrassed on her face, blushing up to her ears. 

"I… forgot, I'm not with the clan anymore," Merrill whispered, voice and body both shaking. She burrowed into his chest and wrapped her legs around Carver's calves, her toes rubbing through the light dusting of hair there. "You don't… you wouldn't care about things like that." 

Carver tucked his arm around her waist, tightening his grip on her. "Hey," he soothed awkwardly, "it's not like I believe in the Maker… well, much." He pictured the pinched face of his mother at his amendment. Ugh. "I, uh, I may have been raised like that, but I don't want to make you feel like you have to give anything up for…" 

Well, 'whatever this is' felt too vague for the world-shattering event that was kissing her, and also too casual for the way she fit into his arms like they were built for each other. But they had only kissed, and now snuggled a little, so to name it as anything felt premature and presumptuous. 

But didn't he want a name for this? 

"For this," Merrill murmured. She splayed a hand over his chest, right above his heart. "I—I don't know what you want from me, Little Hawke," she said, and Carver's guts churned at the uncertainty in her voice, "but I know what I want from this."

It was Carver's turn to shiver. "Y—yeah?" 

"Yes." Her hand slid up his chest to cup his nape and bring him down. "Everything," she murmured, "anything," and then she pressed up to capture his mouth again.


	6. Chapter 6

Merrill licked her way into his mouth, taking advantage of Carver's surprised gasp to slide past his lips. Carver groaned and rolled them over, pulling her atop him but never breaking the intensity of their kiss. His hands found Merrill's waist with unerring accuracy and clamped down on her hips. 

"Gods," she murmured into his mouth, "Carver, please…" 

"Anything." Carver opened his eyes to find her staring down at him, eyes wide and shadowy dark in the mottled magelight. _" Anything,_ Merr." 

Merrill reared back, resting her weight at Carver's pelvis, the curve of her ass hitting just above the line of his stirring cock. She took his hands in her own. "Touch me," she commanded, bringing his hands to her belly. "Please…"

A blush burned its way over Carver's face at the intensity of her gaze. He shifted beneath her and let his hands roam, his fingers trailing over the soft fabric of her chemise. The hemline of her night-rail rose as she got comfortable, hips undulating absently. She sighed when his hands rose to her breasts, and Carver rolled her nipples between his fingers, earning a soft gasp. 

"Carver," she said, not Little Hawke, not Junior, not anything else. Carver, she said, seeing him and only him. 

The flame that bloomed in his chest turned into a raging wildfire in his gut. 

Carver wrapped an arm around her back and sat up, cradling her against his chest. He lowered his mouth to hers and trailed kisses from her mouth to her cheek, her jaw, her neck. Even after days in the wilderness, with only the nearby stream for washing in, she still smelled like trees and clean sweat and campfire smoke. He buried his nose in the hollow of her shoulder. 

"Oh," she said, a punched-out little sound. Merrill wriggled against him, her hips rocking erratically, and her hands fisted in the short strands of his hair. _ "Creators, yesss."_

The hissed sound went straight to Carver's cock. He rose his free hand to cup her breast, thumbing over the stiff peak of her nipple to pull sweet noises from Merrill's lips. His mouth followed, scraping his teeth across the fabric of her nightgown, over the swell of her breast. 

"Please," she murmured again, her hands holding him close.

Merrill keened when his lips first swept over her nipple, her fingers fisting in his hair. Carver sucked at it through the fabric, nipping at her skin. His hands crawled under Merrill's nightgown to rake up her back. 

She was like clay in his hands, bending and molding to his touch. It was addicting, more so than any lyrium. Merrill moaned and shuddered when he switched to give attention to her other breast, and her hips and thighs squeezed where she straddled his lap. It was, frankly, embarrassing how lightheaded Carver was already, his blood rushing to his groin. 

Merrill arched and rubbed against his cock. Through the thin fabrics of his trousers, he could feel her and her apparent lack of smalls, blazing hot where they touched. Merrill undulated into him, lithe and fluid when his hands fell to her hips, and Carver squeezed because he could, because it dragged a moan from her lips. 

She pulled back enough to tear the chemise from her body, the light fabric slipping over her head with a hush. Her skin was flushed pink from her cheeks to her navel, and he couldn't help dragging the fingers of one hand down to follow the blush. 

"Guess this answers that question," Carver murmured. He sketched his fingertips over the thin lines of Merrill's tattoos; they swirled from the goblet of her throat to her collarbones and trailed down into the valley of her breasts. 

"What question?" Merrill asked, breathless, arching her back to push into his touch. 

"How far these go. I've been wondering…" 

She laughed. "You could have asked, you know." Her expression turns sly, knowing, and she rocks meaningfully against his cock. "I would have shown you." 

Carver groans. "If I'd known that, Merr, it wouldn't have taken us so long to get here. Chalk another one up to me being dumb." 

Merrill surprised him when she took his face in her hands, angling his gaze to her face. "It's not dumb," she said, her eyes soft but no less hungry in their intensity. "It's not dumb to want to be sure. Besides," she continued, "I could have asked where your mabari tattoo is any time I wanted, but I didn't, did I?" 

"It's on my butt," Carver blurted out, "got it the year I joined the army, not my idea." He stared at her in abject horror. The words just _exploded_ out of him. Oh, Maker, he ruined it, Merrill would think he's an idiot, she'd—

But Merrill only laughed, that full-belly, having-fun laugh Carver loved so much, and his heart swelled at the sound, even as the rest of him trembled with embarrassment. 

"Well," she murmured, a grin playing across her lips. Merrill leaned into him, pressing her chest against his own. She still was so warm, a fire in his hands. "Hopefully, I'll get to see it before the night's out." 

The promise of her smile went straight to his dick and Carver groaned, palming at the firm muscles of her ass. "How are you even real?" he wondered. He stilled, then shook his head. "Nope. Don't answer that. Don't tell me this is just a dream." 

Merrill dipped her head to whisper in Carver's ear, her breath stirring the hairs there and setting a shiver to run down his spine. "My dreams are fun, you know." 

"I—oh, fuck." 

She stiffened, so imperceptible that he might not have felt it if they weren't plastered together the way they were. "Unless—unless I've read this all wrong, and you don't… don't want to…" 

Carver jolted, catching her by surprise. "No!" He winced. "I mean, no, you haven't read this wrong, I just…" 

He studied her face. Merrill's eyes were wide with hurt, such an abrupt change from their earlier desire. Her lip trembled even as she bit it still, and the blush burned deeper red across her cheeks to dust the tips of her ears crimson. 

"I don't want to mess this up," Carver whispered. He gingerly raised his hand to cup her cheek, silently reveling in the way his hand splayed so wide over her skin. "I've wanted you—wanted _this_—for so long, I'm afraid now that I have you here." 

"You can be happy." Her voice trembled. Merrill fisted her hands in the thin linen of Carver's sleep tunic. "You don't ever have to be afraid with me, Carver." 

Maybe it was the adrenaline. Maybe it was the way she said his name—reverent, hushed, like it was a prayer. It could have been the way the flickering magelight fell on her face and highlighted the slant of her nose, the brightness of her eyes. 

Whatever it was, he felt _it_ pull at him from behind his breastbone, something like falling and a lot like love, but just… _more_ of it than he’d ever felt before. And he had felt it before, love, back in Lothering, back in the village outside Amaranthine before it. Puppy love, his mother had called it. Still, it had earned a long walk with his father as he crested manhood, one of many. Malcolm taught Carver more about being a man by how he talked about Leandra than Carver learned in any of the lessons on anatomy and respect.

Love. He was in _love_ with Merrill, the Dalish elf he had met by chance some three years ago, the woman who made him laugh and actually _like_ the shithole that was Kirkwall. The woman who had become one of his best friends, even in the face of his glorious sibling, someone who _saw_ Carver for who and what he was, not what he wasn't.

His eyes threatened to mist over. _ "Merrill," _ was all he could say in the face of that groundbreaking revelation, whispered again and again. Carver took her in his arms once more and turned them, laying her into the furs so he could dust light kisses all over her face. 

"You have too many clothes on," Merrill murmured back, chasing the pressure of his lips with her own. 

He snorted and fumbled to his knees. Carver loosened the laces of his tunic before flinging it off, tossing it somewhere to be found later. Merrill's greedy hands brought him down to the pallet once more, even before he managed to slide his trousers down and kick them somewhere unseen. 

Merrill sighed a soft noise. "Creators, you are beautiful. I had always known, but…" She trailed off, and Carver looked up to find her gaze rake over him, desire plain on her face. Merrill reached for him and he went gladly, letting her push him to his back once more. 

His breath punched out of him like a wheeze when Merrill immediately swung one long, slender thigh over his lap to straddle him. She was like quicksilver through Carver's hands, dripping fluidly along his body. Her hands braced on his abs, Merrill steadied herself with a shaking laugh. 

"Gods, you're just so… _big_. Not such a Little Hawke, after all!" 

Carver ran his hands up her thighs. Each one could cover more than halfway around her leg at its broadest point, and his mind raced with the implications and possibilities. He traced his thumbs up, up, up until they hit the crease of where her thigh met her hip, and she shuddered, pressing her ass just right against his dick. 

"I want to know how to make you feel good," Carver groaned. His hands stuttered at her hips, thumbs rubbing erratic circles over the wings of Merrill's hipbones. "I want—Maker, Merrill, I want you to feel good." 

Merrill laughed, and Carver could feel it everywhere they touched. Instead of answering, she only slid her hand from where it perched at his belly. Merrill drew her fingers up her thigh with a grin. "Watch," she whispered, just before trailing her fingers down her pelvis. 

And—yeah, oh yeah, the sigh Merrill made when she circled her clit with her fingers when straight to his cock. Carver couldn't help but cant his hips upward, and she only rode the motion, stroking herself. His dick nestled in the cleft of Merrill's ass, and with every move she made, it grew more difficult to keep from touching her. 

"Merrill," he bit out, fingertips leaving tiny bruises to dot along her hips, "I want—I want—" 

She bit her lip, nodding at the unspoken request. Her slick coated her fingers when she reached for Carver's hand and led it to the swollen bud of her clit. 

This, Carver thought, near delirious, _this_ would be with him 'til the day he died. 

Carver stroked his thumb over the sensitive nub, dragging down through her slick folds and returning over and over. She sighed and rolled her hips, lazy and unfocused. Merrill reached behind her to take his cock in hand, pressing it tighter against her as she rocked in his lap. 

"Merr, you keep doing that, and—" 

Her hand only tightened, taking him into her fist almost out of spite. Merrill chuckled weakly, peering at him from under long, sooty lashes. He bucked into her hand without finesse, only barely having the grace not to knock her from her perch above him. 

"I want you," she whispered. It was Carver's only warning before Merrill rose to her knees, took him in hand, and slowly guided him into the tight sheath of her cunt. 

The feel of her sinking down on him stole Carver's breath. Everything in him stilled, his whole world narrowing down to the sensation of every small undulation around his cock. Merrill gasped above him, and Carver wasn't any more articulate, his every breath shaking out of him. 

"So big," she muttered dreamily, her head lolling back. Merrill worked, shuddering, thighs quaking, until she was fully seated. 

A gasped _" please," _ was all Carver could manage, and he swore he almost blacked out when Merrill nodded, mouth agape, and began to move. 

She rose and sank of her own accord, her walls clenched tight around his dick. Carver's hands caught on her hips and he helped, rocking his hips into her, feet digging into the blankets beneath him. He groaned her name like a litany as if any god could hear him. 

“Merrill… Merrill… _Merrill_...”

She only tilted her hips, finding a new angle that made her breath hitch and her muscles flex beneath Carver's hands. Shaking, she leaned forward, all cat-like grace, and Carver shuffled his feet to gain better leverage, driving into her velvet-silk heat in earnest. 

Muddled elvhen fell from her lips, sharp sighs and gasps pulled from her chest. _" Vhenan," _ she murmured, the only audible maybe-word he could tease out. Merrill's mouth crashed down onto his, almost frantic in her need, her tongue pressing past his lips to seek his own. Carver opened easily to her and Merrill all but purred with pleasure at his eagerness, sinking into his mouth possessively.  
She did something with her hips and he keened into her mouth, biting back the scream that threatened to overwhelm him. 

"Carver," she whimpered, "_vhenan,_ I—please, please…" 

"I've got you," he moaned against the plush, kiss-swollen red of her lips. His hand slid between them, trailing over her belly to skirt around her clit. Merrill's cunt fluttered around his cock, and he almost yelped, her slick channel tight as a fist. 

Merrill ground down between his hand and his dick, and Carver could only ride the buck of her body. The sound of her cries filled the tent alongside the _slapslapslap_ of skin on skin, obscene and pure. She dropped her head to press into his chest, throwing herself backward, meeting him thrust for thrust. 

Everything in her tightened in one glorious motion. "Carver," she managed, breathless and wobbly, his name turning into a high, keening moan, wordless and unmistakable. Merrill shook and juddered under his hands as she came, grinding through it. 

Carver wasn't far off; her noises pulled something animal from him, and he flipped them over, pressing Merrill down into the blankets as he stroked into her. He hiked Merrill's legs up to his chest and she panted feverishly, encouraging with little moans and gasps. Carver caged her in and crushed his mouth against hers, licking clumsily into her mouth. His hand snaked to the small of her back to lift Merrill's hips.

He could feel the orgasm before it arrived, the smoldering heat that pooled in his groin shooting up his spine. Another stroke, two, three, and Carver finally came, groaning against her lips. It was like lightning scattered across his skin, only to set every hair on end and send sparks rushing through him. 

His arms shook. Everything in him shook, trembling against the weight of what just happened. Carver nipped at the skin beneath Merrill's ear just to do it, just to hear the soft, contented sigh that escaped her. Reluctant, he pulled out, only to realize his lack of control spilling down her thighs. 

"Shit," Carver said, dumb. He flopped to his side, his arm still draped possessively across Merrill's ribs. "I didn't—I didn't even think to ask if I could..." Carver trailed off, feeling heat sear across his face. 

But Merrill didn't look cross or angry when he looked up, only a cat-like pleasure, mouth curled into a knowing smile. "Don't worry," she murmured. "I have a special tea for that. And—and I liked it," Merrill added. Her cheeks, already colored with exertion, flushed a darker pink. "I liked that you couldn't pull away. It felt really nice." 

"Well, if you liked it..." 

"I did," she promised, shifting to face him. Merrill dragged a hand through his hair to settle at Carver's nape. "Know that I would never let you do to me anything I don't want."

"That's... actually really reassuring," Carver said slowly. He considered her, eyes trailing down her face. "I didn't think of it like that." 

She grinned, playful. "See? I told you I would keep you safe, even from yourself. I can protect myself. You don't have to worry." 

Carver sighed and pulled her close, letting her nestle with her face pressed into his throat. Already he could hear the long-forgotten call of slumber, but something niggled at his conscience...

"Merr," he asked cautiously, "what does _vhenan_ mean?" 

Merrill stiffened, then relaxed in Carver's arms, nuzzling at his shoulder where it joined his neck. "It's an endearment," she murmured, "for those we care about." 

"Oh," he said. He closed his eyes and settled against the lean planes of Merrill's body. "Okay. It sounded nice when you said it." 

He was halfway to sleep when he heard her soft, wistful response. 

"It _is_ nice."


	7. Chapter 7

Merrill was already gone by the time Carver woke up, smiling as he broke from the Fade. He tried not to let that sting, that she didn't stay. It was none of his business, after all; she was a woman grown and had her own things to tend to in the mornings. It had just been the best sleep he'd had in… a long time, Carver realized, the sun already high in the sky above the canvas ceiling. He shuffled into his clothes and ran a hand through his sleep-tousled hair. Carver wanted to be halfway presentable, at least, if nothing else.

A lilting tune carried through the woods to Carver's right when he got to the cold campfire. It warmed something profound inside of him, to hear her so obviously content; it had been too long since he'd listened to the likes of it. 

"Merr?" he called with a smile. 

"Over here!" 

He followed the sound of her voice toward the nearby stream, where she was digging out a deep pool with the camp shovel. Merrill sang as she worked and redirected the water with a spell. Carver could feel it, the scent of her magic, ozone and blood. 

"What's this, then?" 

Merrill looked up, and the smile that crested her face was as brilliant as the dawn. "It's a secret," she said, glancing around in mock-conspiratorial glee. "Don't worry about it!"

Oh. "I can help, though, can't I?" 

"Why don't you check the traps? Maybe breakfast is another rabbit."

Carver, long since used to being shuffled away in favor of his siblings, tried not to let this sting, too. "Okay," he muttered, stomach tight. "That's a good idea. I'll-- I'll do that." 

So she didn't want him around right now. _That’s okay,_ Carver told himself. Her business is her own. It was probably nothing, anyway. 

"Oh, wait!"

He turned, swallowing down the misery that threatened to take root in his belly--only to be met by Merrill, flinging herself at him. He stumbled as he caught her. Merrill threw her arms around his neck and wrapped her legs around his waist, unbothered.

"Good morning, Carver," she said, grinning, just before pressing in for a kiss. 

It was no less heart-stopping than any from last night, despite its initial chasteness. A gentle glide of skin on skin, he could feel the shape of her smile against his mouth. Merrill's fingers played with the unruly hairs at the nape of his neck, and she licked at the seam of his lips. He opened to her gladly and sighed at the satisfied noise Merrill made. 

Carver could get used to this. He wanted to get used to this. 

_Please, Maker, or Creators, or whoever's listening,_ Carver prayed. Merrill nibbled at his lower lip, her teeth sharp but gentle on his skin. _Show me how I can keep this._

They parted, wearing identical blushes. Merrill buried her nose into the crook of his shoulder. "Good morning," she said again, muffled by his tunic. 

"Good morning," he rasped out. "I, uh. Thought I was checking on breakfast?" 

"I wanted to make sure to say hello." Merrill turned her head to plaster kisses up Carver's throat. "Hello, Carver."

"Oh… Hello, Merrill," he murmured back, warmth flooding into the nooks and crannies of his heart. Carver held her easily, one arm pinned to her back and the other under her thighs. 

"You're so strong," she murmured into the hollow of his throat. "I don't think I've ever known someone so strong." 

"I, well, it comes with the territory." 

Merrill looked up, her confusion evident on her face. "What territory?"

"It's, uh, a figure of speech." Carver helped her slide down to her feet, his hands never leaving her. "Like, um." 

She blinked up at him. 

"I'm a terrible teacher," Carver admitted. "But basically, it means, uh, that I'm strong because of the things I do. Like… being in the army and being a templar. Those things need me to be strong, so I am strong." 

"Oh," she said, then, quietly, "that wasn't so hard. Why don't the others ever explain…?" Merrill shook her head and turned away before Carver could answer. "Oh, anyway, breakfast?" She fluttered her lashes at him with a smile. "And then I'll show you the secret." 

He peered past her head to the muddy waters of the stream bank. It was… just a stream. What was the secret? "Sure, Merr. I'll be back soon." 

"But not too soon!" she called to him when he turned and started off toward the snares. 

Carver hesitated. "But not too soon," he agreed. Whatever that meant.

* * *

Breakfast wasn't another rabbit, but he found a patch of ripe berries that would serve just as well and some acorns for roasting later. He filled his pockets gingerly and made his way back to the empty fire pit, pulling a tin pot from their provisions and depositing his haul inside. 

Merrill was singing to herself in elvhen again as he walked to the stream. This tune was melodic, fluid in a way he didn't recognize, not one of her usual happy songs he knew from before. He couldn't place how it made him feel, just that it _did_.

Maker, Carver was so far gone for her.

"Look," Merrill chirped, just as soon as Carver broke from the trees. She jogged over and took him by the hand. Merrill lead him to the makeshift pool in the middle of the stream, now a circle of rocks and about as wide as Carver was tall. He could see it was noticeably deeper than the streambed, but otherwise, the stream looked undisturbed.

It also looked… steamy, with light wisps of it playing over the surface. 

"Uh…?" 

Merrill beamed proudly. "I set fire runes into the rocks, so it's like a little hot spring!" She pointed at the rock wall, wedged together with mosses and small pebbles. It made a useful little dam, keeping the worst of the stream's current out of the pool. 

"That's amazing," Carver said, awed. He turned to Merrill and, pouring every ounce of sincerity into his words, said, "_You_ are amazing. I didn't know this kind of thing was possible." 

"Oh, you," Merrill preened. "Anything is possible if you work for it. You know that, don't you?" Her smile dropped, a touch worried, before it cleared again. "Anyway, I thought we might like a hot bath today, instead of cold!" 

She was already stripping her vest off and gesturing Carver to follow by the time she finished her sentence. Carver, blushing, followed, draping his clothes over a nearby tree branch, picking her discarded garments to do the same. A splash sounded behind him, and Carver steeled himself.

He's seen her naked. They've had sex. They're obviously interested in each other. 

He can take a damn bath with her, it'll be fine. 

It was _not_ fine--Merrill was chewing her lip, biting back an obvious peal of laughter when he turned to the stream. 

"It really is on your butt," she said, voice shaking with mirth. She made room for Carver in the small makeshift pool. "I thought you had been joking me." 

Carver groaned and buried his face in his hands, sinking until his ass hit the smoothly paved bottom. "I was drunk," he said by explanation. "My platoon thought it was funny. We all got them for strength." 

"You'd have to be very strong," Merrill agreed, not bothering to keep the laughter from her words, "to get it on your butt." 

Carver blushed even redder and slunk further into the water. "Yeah, well. I was 17." 

"Oh, don't be that way." Merrill waded to him and slotted herself into his lap, her hands curling around his shoulders. "I think it's cute." 

Carver perked up. "Yeah? Even though...?" 

Merrill nodded. "Even though it's a mabari," she agreed. She dusted Carver's face with kisses, plastering them across his brow, his nose, his jaw. "It suits you." 

Carver threaded his hands into her hair and pulled her into a proper kiss, a glide of lips that wound through him like a summer wind. It was light, delicate, gentle. He loved her for it. 

"You--you what?" 

She pulled away, her hands still at his nape. Merrill's eyes were wide, nervous. "Carver?" 

"I—"

He must have said it out loud, somewhere in the haze. Carver swallowed hard. "I said I--I love you, Merrill." 

Merrill gave a small, wounded gasp. Her hands fisted at his shoulders. "I… Do you mean it?" she demanded. "You're not—you're not joking?" 

"When have I ever successfully told a joke?" Carver said wryly. "But yeah. I mean it, Merr. I do. You don't have to—_mmph!" _

Merrill leaped at him, capturing his mouth in a bruising kiss. She twined herself around him and held him fast, biting and nipping at the sensitive skin of Carver's lips and jaw. "Oh, Carver," she murmured, edging on a moan when his hands cupped her ass. "Carver, Carver, _Carver." _

He tipped his head back for her easy access when she nibbled her way toward his throat. Carver hissed at the press of teeth along his skin but didn't pull back, only let her suck bruising kisses down the column of his throat. Merrill worried the flesh of his shoulder between her teeth and it stung mutely, hardly a distraction when her hips rolled beneath his hands. 

"I take it that—_ohhh,_ do that again--that I didn't mess this up?" Despite the way Merrill moved against him, it was still a dense weight in Carver's belly, the possibility that he misread, misunderstood— 

_" Vhenan,"_ Merrill groaned in reply, cutting off his inner worries. "Touch me." 

And who was Carver to disobey?

Carver surged from the water. Merrill clung to him, laughing as he laid her gingerly into the pillow-soft, moss-covered earth. She reached for him, but Carver only kissed his way from her mouth down her throat to her chest. 

He trailed his mouth between the valley of her breasts, curled his tongue around the stiffened peaks of her nipples. Carver took one of Merrill's hands and cemented it in his hair before moving on, licking wet trails over the softness of her belly. He spread her thighs with his hands and settled between them, draping her legs down his back, cock trapped between his body and the mossy ground. 

"Is this okay?" he asked. 

Merrill rattled off a string of elvhen, breathless, chest heaving. Gooseflesh pebbled her skin, where the crisp air met the water that still washed over her. She tightened her fingers in his hair and guided him to dip his head. 

The _noise_ Merrill made when Carver first spread her folds and licked into her had him rutting into the soft moss and grass beneath them. She tasted like… like musk and sunshine and love and smoke. He licked it up eagerly, lapping at Merrill's clit with messy strokes to the sound of her mewling. 

_ "Vhenan," _ she gasped out when Carver angled to dip into her cunt.

The word dripped like honey over Carver's nerves, soothing and sweet. He closed his eyes, focusing on the scent and taste of her, the way her thighs quaked over his shoulders. Merrill shook and bucked into his mouth, her heels digging into his back, her hand tight in his hair.  
"Carver, yes, yes!" 

He could get addicted to the way his name sounded in her mouth. 

Carver changed his approach, pulled off only to slide a hand up her thigh to sink a finger into her heat. She pulled his hair, insistent, and he followed, crawling up gladly to capture Merrill's lips, sharing the taste of her with a rumbling groan. She whined into his mouth at the stretch of a second finger in her cunt. 

"I love the way you sound," he murmured. Carver nibbled at her lower lip, swallowing the sound of her gasp as he curled his fingers. He hiked her legs to wrap around his hips, his hand working between them. Carver leaked over her belly where they touched, but neither paid any mind. "I love the way you taste. The way you say my name." 

Carver couldn't stop, addicted to the punched out moans she made with every admission. He curled his fingers again, thumb circling Merrill's stiffened clit. "I love the way you blush," he whispered into her mouth. "How you sing when you're happy, the way you sigh when you're bored. Maker, Merrill, I love you so damned much." 

Merrill bucked, and he eagerly rode the rhythm of her hips. Carver stroked inside her again and then she was gone, all but screaming as she came. Her hands left his hair to scrabble down his back; her sharp nails dug into his skin only halfway painfully, and he caught the way she groaned his name with his mouth. 

It was only when she whispered out a soft, amazed, _" vhenan," _ that Carver got it, that he understood what it meant. 

"You love me too," he said, stunned. His heart thundered in his chest. 

And she only nodded, smiling languidly; Merrill licked her lips and looked for all the world like a satisfied desire demon. 

"I do," she said, like it didn't tilt the world on its axis, like it didn't change the sun and moons in their orbits. "Oh, vhenan, my heart. I love you so much. Let me show you?" Merrill asked, shy. 

"What--oh, ohh." Carver let himself be pushed to his back, watching the trees blankly and trying not to buck into Merrill's hand when she took him into her fist. He closed his eyes and focused on the way she squeezed him, wrapped tight around his cock. 

Another squeeze was his only warning. Carver's eyes flew open, and he rolled his hips instinctively at the feel of her mouth around his cockhead. He looked down his body to find her mouth stretched full, obscene, and lips a puffy pink. Carver moaned weakly and dropped his head with a thud. 

"Fucking void, Merrill." It took all he had not to thrust up into that heat. She took him greedily, sinking down and swallowing slowly, one arm braced across his pelvis and her other hand cupping his balls. 

It was embarrassingly easy to make him come. Merrill swallowed again, throat tight around the head of Carver's cock, and her fingers drifted from his balls to massage the sensitive skin just beneath. Soon enough, he was coming, thrusting up to drive into her willing mouth as he did. He shouted something unintelligible and the world whited out.

* * *

When Carver came back to consciousness, it was to a body that laid languid and sprawling and to the feel of Merrill's fingers sketching across his chest hair. 

"Wow," he finally said, when he found his voice again. 

"Good, I hope?" Merrill's voice rasped in his ear, sounding bruised and wrecked. It curled Carver's toes to know he did that. 

He squeezed her tight to his chest. "Yeah, you could say that," he chuckled weakly. Carver nosed into the sweaty hair at Merrill's temple to the sound of her laughter. 

"I love you, too, you know," Merrill murmured. "Vhenan. My heart. My Carver." 

"I like the sound of that." 

Merrill hummed, the noise thrumming between them. 

"What now?" he asked. Merrill turned her head to look up with him, eyes full of joy. 

"I think now we have those berries for breakfast and soak in the pool, and then maybe have sex again. What do you think?"

Carver choked on his tongue for a moment. "Y--yeah, I think—yeah," he coughed, "I think that's good, good, yeah. Good." 

Merrill laughed, full-bellied and bright, and helped him back into the pool.

* * *

The rest of the day was spent lounging in their little paradise. Merrill's spells kept the pool warm for as long as they were in it, and at some point, the snares had caught another two rabbits. Carver prepared them as Merrill foraged for more herbs and returned with a handful of tubers and herbs; soon enough, a makeshift stew sat over the fire. They made love lazily in the shelter of their tent, learning each other's sighs and moans as the day wore on. 

"I wish we could stay like this forever," Merrill muttered. Her hand stroked through Carver's hair where they lay tangled together. "Our own little dream."

Carver made a noise. "Yeah," he said. Carver bit his lip. "What now?" he asked, again, hurrying to clarify when Merrill opened her mouth. "I don't mean, what next for today, but what now, for us? I'm a human, and a Templar. I don't--I wouldn't blame you if you didn't want…" 

"The shape of our ears doesn't mean anything," Merrill said, a touch sharp. She rolled up to sit with Carver's head in her lap. Her hand drifted to trail her fingertips over the edge of his ear as if to prove her point. "Pointy or not, there's no difference. And the… and the Circle…" 

"I won't let anyone hurt you," Carver said quietly when Merrill trailed off. He could see the sheen of tears growing in her eyes. "Besides," he went on, thinking of the brackish draught waiting for him in his travel bag, "I've wanted to quit for a while now. Maybe I'll find something closer to town." 

"Something not so dangerous," Merrill murmured, and he knew she didn't mean just for himself.

"Yeah. Something better." 

The look she gave him warmed something deep inside. Carver thought he might stay warm even through the upcoming miserable Kirkwall winter if she kept looking at him like that.

_We'll make it work,_ he promised himself. He would spend the rest of his life looking at that wide smile.

* * *

Carver and Merrill showed up to the next Wicked Grace night holding hands, the night before Carver had to leave again for the Gallows.

“Fucking _finally,”_ Isabela crowed. “I _told_ you it would work!” She held out her hand expectantly, and the whole table groaned. 

Fenris scoffed and dug into his coin purse. "It's not anyone's fault they have no more sense than that given to a goose," he grumbled, passing over a shiny gold piece. 

Anders held his head in his hands. "Two more free visits," he groaned, "as promised. That really shouldn't have worked as well as it did." 

Aveline handed over a gold piece without a word, as did Sebastian. The Brother looked concernedly between Merrill and Carver, something unsaid plain on his face. 

Varric chuckled and spread his hands when the others stared at him, expectant. "What? I knew something would come of it. I didn't take the bet for a good reason. My mother only raised one idiot, and, surprise surprise, I was not it." 

Eli only clapped their hands in excitement. "Oh good," they said, smiling widely. "Mother's going to be so happy. I can see the porcelain arrangements at your wedding banquet already."

"Yeah, ah, about that," Carver hedged. "Could you let us tell her?" He glanced back at Merrill, who only squeezed his hand with encouragement. "You know how she gets about things." 

"Void, she's still trying to marry me off," Eli agreed. "She doesn't know I have all I need right here." They wrapped an arm around Isabela and blew a wet raspberry on her cheek, obnoxious and playful and earning a flirtatious shove in retaliation. 

"Actually, Eli… Can we talk a minute? In private," Carver added, when the table hushed from its low roar. 

Eli followed Carver outside with a smile and closed the door behind them. "What's up?" 

"I… I want to quit the Templars. It made sense when I made the decision," he said, raising a hand to wave off whatever Eli might have said. "We thought you were dead and needed more money than I was bringing in. But now... " 

"Things have changed." 

"Yeah," Carver sighed. "They have, and for the better. But I can't continue working for Meredith, not now. And I'll need help getting out." 

Eli whistled, low and incredulous. "I'll see what I can do," they muttered, "but leaving's usually done in a pine box." 

"I know." Carver scrubbed his face with his hands. "I definitely know. Another reason I want out. The lyrium's driving me batty, and it's been only two years, not even. And—" 

"You don't have to explain yourself, Carv." Eli clapped their hand on his shoulder. It was a comforting weight, one that brought Carver back to before the Blight, to the sun-bright fields of Ferelden. They smiled, and Carver let himself be drawn into a tight hug. "I'm here, Carver," Eli said. "However I can help, I will." 

Carver choked back something rough in his throat. "Thank you." 

"Any time."

They parted, and Carver cleared his throat, wiping his eyes. "Wanna go see me lose to Isabela? She better be buying you something nice with all that coin." 

Eli's eyes crinkled with mirth. "Oh, she does," they said gamely, "but you don't want details." 

“I--ew, _ew._ No more heart-to-hearts, I need a drink.” 

Eli laughed and slung an arm around Carver's shoulders as they returned to Varric's suite. "See, Carv, when two--or more, I'm not judging—people love each other—" 

"Oh, shove off!" But Carver was laughing, too, the lightest he'd felt in years. His eyes met Merrill's and she patted the chair she'd saved for him. 

Carver kissed her temple when he sat beside her, earning a grin, and picked up his freshly-dealt hand.

**Author's Note:**

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